Ahhh! Chapter Four!
I needed a little consult on this chapter, so that's why the delay, and I really hope you guys like it.
Title: “Better Get Out (While You Can)” Part 4
Previous Chapters: Part 1 // Part 2 // Part 3
Pairing: Allusions to House/Stacy, House/Cuddy
Rating: PG-13ish.
Summary: A depiction of the events as I imagine them between the operation on House’s leg and his job at PPTH. Since we don’t know exactly what went down, I’ve taken liberties. Anyway, this is shaping up to be multi-part (fingers crossed the muse doesn't leave me); title pulled from the song “I Don’t Love You,” by My Chemical Romance. Enjoy!
“How did it go?”
Cuddy didn’t speak or even look up from her writing when she heard Wilson’s voice from her doorway. Instead, she tightened her grip on her pen and pushed even harder onto the paper, so that the instrument bent slightly under the pressure.
Not taking her silence as any kind of dismissal, he shut the door behind himself and came further into her office, still with no reaction from her.
“That well?” he asked softly, crossing his arms.
This time, Cuddy only flashed him a hardened glance, never dropping a letter in the notes she was taking.
Wilson’s concern deepened with that, and he frowned.
“Seriously?”
As he sat down across from her, Cuddy reluctantly put her pen down and looked up, wishing she hadn’t told Wilson she was going to go to House’s the night before.
“It was bad.” She reported simply.
Still puzzled by her taciturnity, Wilson tilted his head.
“How bad?”
Cuddy leaned back on her chair and stared at her hands in her lap. “Bad.”
She obviously didn’t want to elaborate, but Wilson was persistent.
“Was Stacy right about the therapy? About the Vicodin?”
Drawing her eyes from her lap, Cuddy stared at him.
“She told you about the Vicodin?”
Startled by the sudden anger in her voice, Wilson held his hands up.
“Just that it was the only measure he was willing to take. Why, what about it?”
Cuddy shook her head quickly. “Nothing.”
“Lisa, tell me what happened.”
Realizing she was being rather childish, and Wilson was really only concerned about House, Cuddy sighed.
“What happened was, I walked in expecting a mess, at worst a disaster…” The memory of House screaming at her and pinning her against the wall in rage flashed in her mind but quickly faded. “…what I got was Chernobyl.”
“Christ.” Wilson shook his head. “What was it?”
“Everything.” She murmured. “I can’t get through to him. I don’t know if anyone can.”
Puzzlement came back to Wilson’s face at the sound of defeat in her voice.
“What happened?”
With a humorless smile, Cuddy shook her head.
“He’s ruined. I ruined him.”
“Are you seriously saying that? Not only have you written him off, but you’re assuming all the responsibility?” Wilson asked incredulously, staring at her like she’d grown a third head.
“You didn’t see him, James.” She snapped suddenly. “You didn’t…you didn’t go. You sent me, and…”
“I’m sorry. It was unfair. I just thought…” Wilson’s chin quivered slightly as he raked both hands through his hair. “But Lisa, to assume all the responsibility…”
“I don’t want to fight with you about it. Or anyone.” She replied, sitting forward again and picking up her pen. The conversation was over.
Please, let this conversation be over.
“So what are we going to do?” Wilson asked then, apparently expecting a well-thought out plan.
“What can we do? I’m telling you, James, he’s…I can’t even describe it.” Cuddy slowly twirled the pen in one hand and mirrored Wilson’s motion with the other by tugging on her own hair.
“So we just give up, don’t help him, let him destroy himself?”
“He doesn’t want help. He just wants to die.” Cuddy spat, disgust and frustration oozing from her words, which, as they hung in the air of her office, suddenly made her skin crawl. She couldn’t tell if it was because they seemed untrue-or far too true.
“You really believe that?” Wilson asked quietly, staring at her.
Holding his gaze, Cuddy considered. It had come out of her mouth then because it had been resounding in her head for the entire night before, after she just barely walked out to her car, cried the whole way to her house, and then lay in her own tub for hours with a glass and bottle of red wine sitting on the ledge, in easy reach.
But then…she had dreamed of House as he was. Sure, a romanticized version-it was a dream and she had been drinking. But still, the dreams had triggered real memories, and those had been on her mind all day.
Greg House, as he was, loved being alive. Sure, he didn’t like most people or most arbitrary aspects of life like politeness, kindness, or sentimentality, but as far as being alive…it was everything. He didn’t believe in anything else. He believed in medicine, loved practicing it, and you can’t do that dead.
So…
“I don’t know.” She admitted finally. “But I can find out.”
#
This time when she knocked, he responded almost immediately.
“It’s unlocked.”
Stepping in, she had braced herself for even more destruction, but at least as far as she could tell, he hadn’t done any more damage since she’d left.
But, nothing looked better. Just status quo.
He was once again draped out on the couch, a few pillows elevating his leg, and had a bottle of Scotch nearby.
He was conscious, and had been for some time, but he was higher than a kite, and unfortunately, not happily sedated like most people would have been in his condition. It was almost like Vicodin, or his acknowledged need for it, made him even more miserable.
Which was, oddly, promising.
When he focused on her, he scowled deeply but didn’t speak.
Coming around the couch and standing beside the now only slightly cluttered coffee table, she placed a prescription bottle on the table.
“Kidney stones. Decrease in and eventual cease of sexual performance. Hypertension. Hepatic necrosis.” She listed blandly, crossing her arms and staring down at him.
Eying the bottle, he muttered, “I know the long-term effects of Vicodin use.”
“It’s not a very prudent way to kill yourself,” she informed him flatly.
“What makes you think I want to kill myself?”
“What else could you want?”
“To manage my pain.” He shouted, hand distractedly going to his thigh and clenching around the void.
“Manage it to what end?” She asked angrily, matching his volume and tossing her arms.
“So I can…”
“What? Live?”
Rubbing his head with his other hand, House pressed his eyes shut as he shouted, “Yes. Live. Live this life you so kindly bestowed me.”
A tense moment of silence passed as she reached into her jacket pocket.
Opening his eyes-albeit now clouded-House followed every motion she made as she produced a small carrying case and laid it on the table.
“If you’re going to kill yourself, Morphine is quicker.” She explained dryly, unfolding the case to reveal a syringe and vial of clear liquid.
Stunned, noticeably, House raised a dubious eyebrow at her.
“Why, Dr. Cuddy…I didn’t know you graduated from the Kevorkian School of Medicine.”
Ignoring him, Cuddy shrugged.
“Vicodin will just tear you apart from the inside out, and it’ll take its time doing it. At least Morphine is just a quick delivery into a long sleep.”
As she spoke, House picked up the case and examined the glass bottle, then the needle, all with remarkable precision for someone on the slippery slide to an opiate high.
After a moment, he looked up at her again with new consideration.
“Just enough to do the trick, and a small enough needle that the injection point wouldn’t be evident unless specifically sought. Probably would have told me to put it between my toes, too.” Tapping the empty syringe to his chin, he thought. “Almost as if you’ve done this before.”
She hoped her face didn’t pale, but she was certain it had when he gave her that look, that gotcha look.
“Which one of the kindly doctors you studied under showed you this crafty trick?”
“You want out, this is your way.” She repeated, as if he hadn’t spoken.
House continued, turning the syringe over in his hands as he speculated.
“It couldn’t have been Saunders. He’s a masochist-likes suffering with his patients. Gottlieb was far too optimistic for this kind of nihilistic thinking. Which leaves Glennon. It must have been him. You stayed with him the shortest time, too. All makes sense now.”
Realizing that she couldn’t really say anything that wouldn’t further feed this line of torture, Cuddy remained silent.
Which prompted him to push even harder.
“Who was it? An old grandma gasping her last senile breath? A mother of two with Stage Four ovarian cancer? Who was the first life you took, Dr. Cuddy?”
Her lips twitched as she shifted her weight.
“What’s your decision?”
Still interested, House leaned back against the couch again and shrugged.
“Can’t pressure a man into this kind of decision. Takes time. Consideration.”
“Based on your attitude yesterday, I thought this would be simple.” Cuddy murmured quietly.
House again gave her a dubious look, which slowly collapsed into a miserable one, and then a blank one.
She watched with a hot sourness in her stomach as he snagged the rubber strip from the case and tightened it appropriately on his arm, then tapped above it to stimulate blood flow.
Swallowing, Cuddy remained still as he reached over and filled the syringe with the Morphine, and then cleared the excess from the tip.
She wanted to be brave, to watch as he placed the needle over the bluing vein in the crook of his arm, but her eyes slid shut as tears simmered behind them.
When she heard the sound of the syringe hitting the table, she opened them.
House still had the band around his arm, but had put the syringe-full, she realized with a small intake of breath-back on the table.
It was hard to disguise her relief when she spoke.
“If you don’t want to die,” she scanned the room, gradually bringing her moistening eyes to him, “Then why are you doing this?”
He didn’t respond, except to shake his head so slightly it was barely perceptible.
Moving toward the table, Cuddy placed the syringe and vial back in the case, closed it, and put it back in her jacket.
“Take the Vicodin.”
“And?” he asked, knowing another shoe was about to come crashing down.
“There’s thirty in there. Either make them last the rest of your life, or start going to physical therapy.”
Bringing his hateful gaze back up to her, House asked in disbelief, “Are you kidding me?”
“No. Any further prescriptions for you go through me. I talked to Devlin today, in the dispensary.” She informed him coolly, not letting slip the rage she’d experienced when Devlin had admitted to giving House whatever he prescribed himself, “because he’s Dr. House.”
She’d practically throttled the young doctor (in addition to putting him on a probationary status) for ignoring her prescription, but there were more pressing matters.
“I guess when Hirst retired as Dean he left his megalomania to you.” House remarked darkly, then adding, “I could get it somewhere else.”
“You could.” Cuddy admitted. “But not for long, before you were figured out and blacklisted. It’s kind of hard to explain bouncing between pain doctors.”
The realization-and fury-that she was right registered in his features.
“I’m your access, House. Appreciate it. All for a few weeks of PT.” She offered soliticiously.
With a grunt, his eyes fell upon his leg.
“Let’s cut out your thigh muscle and see how a few weeks of PT feels.”
Knowing she’d won, or would, Cuddy shrugged. “It’s your choice. Let me know.”
“Is it too late to choose the Morphine? I might prefer that to being a subject of Dur Fuhrer.” He shot at her as she walked to the door.
Turning, her hand on the knob, Cuddy shook her head. “That’s not what you really want. You proved as much.”
Her calm must have revealed her, because she didn’t take another step before he said, “It’s Saline, isn’t it?”
Pausing, Cuddy thought seriously about lying to him.
“No. But it wasn’t enough Morphine to kill you.” She told him earnestly, looking over her shoulder at him.
A rueful laugh exploded from his mouth.
“Then what was the point?”
She shrugged.
“I needed to know something.”
“Did you get your answer?” he asked bitterly.
It was the first time she’d smiled since she saw him yesterday.
“Yes.”
After the door was closed behind her, House undid the rubber strip on his arm, and as he toyed with it, muttered to himself,
“We both did.”
#
On average, thirty tablets of Vicodin last a patient a week.
It lasted House three and a half days. Early evening Tuesday to the late hours of Friday night.
Cuddy didn’t have to look at her caller-ID to know it was him when she groped blindly in the darkness of her bedroom for the telephone.
“Dr. Cuddy.”
“I need more. I’ll go to PT in the morning, you can even pick me up. But I need more or I won’t sleep.”
Scrubbing the back of her knuckles in her eyes to wash the sleep out, Cuddy noted the time on the clock.
“I’ll be there at nine-,”
“Cuddy. Pills.”
Chewing on her lip, Cuddy paused.
“I’ll be there at nine, House.”
“Aren’t you listening? I need them now. Not six hours from now, now now.”
“As if you would wait until you were actually out to call me. Take whatever you have left over and were planning to stash, and I’ll bring you a dosage. At nine.”
She hung up before he could say anything else.
Next Part....
Title: “Better Get Out (While You Can)” Part 4
Previous Chapters: Part 1 // Part 2 // Part 3
Pairing: Allusions to House/Stacy, House/Cuddy
Rating: PG-13ish.
Summary: A depiction of the events as I imagine them between the operation on House’s leg and his job at PPTH. Since we don’t know exactly what went down, I’ve taken liberties. Anyway, this is shaping up to be multi-part (fingers crossed the muse doesn't leave me); title pulled from the song “I Don’t Love You,” by My Chemical Romance. Enjoy!
“How did it go?”
Cuddy didn’t speak or even look up from her writing when she heard Wilson’s voice from her doorway. Instead, she tightened her grip on her pen and pushed even harder onto the paper, so that the instrument bent slightly under the pressure.
Not taking her silence as any kind of dismissal, he shut the door behind himself and came further into her office, still with no reaction from her.
“That well?” he asked softly, crossing his arms.
This time, Cuddy only flashed him a hardened glance, never dropping a letter in the notes she was taking.
Wilson’s concern deepened with that, and he frowned.
“Seriously?”
As he sat down across from her, Cuddy reluctantly put her pen down and looked up, wishing she hadn’t told Wilson she was going to go to House’s the night before.
“It was bad.” She reported simply.
Still puzzled by her taciturnity, Wilson tilted his head.
“How bad?”
Cuddy leaned back on her chair and stared at her hands in her lap. “Bad.”
She obviously didn’t want to elaborate, but Wilson was persistent.
“Was Stacy right about the therapy? About the Vicodin?”
Drawing her eyes from her lap, Cuddy stared at him.
“She told you about the Vicodin?”
Startled by the sudden anger in her voice, Wilson held his hands up.
“Just that it was the only measure he was willing to take. Why, what about it?”
Cuddy shook her head quickly. “Nothing.”
“Lisa, tell me what happened.”
Realizing she was being rather childish, and Wilson was really only concerned about House, Cuddy sighed.
“What happened was, I walked in expecting a mess, at worst a disaster…” The memory of House screaming at her and pinning her against the wall in rage flashed in her mind but quickly faded. “…what I got was Chernobyl.”
“Christ.” Wilson shook his head. “What was it?”
“Everything.” She murmured. “I can’t get through to him. I don’t know if anyone can.”
Puzzlement came back to Wilson’s face at the sound of defeat in her voice.
“What happened?”
With a humorless smile, Cuddy shook her head.
“He’s ruined. I ruined him.”
“Are you seriously saying that? Not only have you written him off, but you’re assuming all the responsibility?” Wilson asked incredulously, staring at her like she’d grown a third head.
“You didn’t see him, James.” She snapped suddenly. “You didn’t…you didn’t go. You sent me, and…”
“I’m sorry. It was unfair. I just thought…” Wilson’s chin quivered slightly as he raked both hands through his hair. “But Lisa, to assume all the responsibility…”
“I don’t want to fight with you about it. Or anyone.” She replied, sitting forward again and picking up her pen. The conversation was over.
Please, let this conversation be over.
“So what are we going to do?” Wilson asked then, apparently expecting a well-thought out plan.
“What can we do? I’m telling you, James, he’s…I can’t even describe it.” Cuddy slowly twirled the pen in one hand and mirrored Wilson’s motion with the other by tugging on her own hair.
“So we just give up, don’t help him, let him destroy himself?”
“He doesn’t want help. He just wants to die.” Cuddy spat, disgust and frustration oozing from her words, which, as they hung in the air of her office, suddenly made her skin crawl. She couldn’t tell if it was because they seemed untrue-or far too true.
“You really believe that?” Wilson asked quietly, staring at her.
Holding his gaze, Cuddy considered. It had come out of her mouth then because it had been resounding in her head for the entire night before, after she just barely walked out to her car, cried the whole way to her house, and then lay in her own tub for hours with a glass and bottle of red wine sitting on the ledge, in easy reach.
But then…she had dreamed of House as he was. Sure, a romanticized version-it was a dream and she had been drinking. But still, the dreams had triggered real memories, and those had been on her mind all day.
Greg House, as he was, loved being alive. Sure, he didn’t like most people or most arbitrary aspects of life like politeness, kindness, or sentimentality, but as far as being alive…it was everything. He didn’t believe in anything else. He believed in medicine, loved practicing it, and you can’t do that dead.
So…
“I don’t know.” She admitted finally. “But I can find out.”
#
This time when she knocked, he responded almost immediately.
“It’s unlocked.”
Stepping in, she had braced herself for even more destruction, but at least as far as she could tell, he hadn’t done any more damage since she’d left.
But, nothing looked better. Just status quo.
He was once again draped out on the couch, a few pillows elevating his leg, and had a bottle of Scotch nearby.
He was conscious, and had been for some time, but he was higher than a kite, and unfortunately, not happily sedated like most people would have been in his condition. It was almost like Vicodin, or his acknowledged need for it, made him even more miserable.
Which was, oddly, promising.
When he focused on her, he scowled deeply but didn’t speak.
Coming around the couch and standing beside the now only slightly cluttered coffee table, she placed a prescription bottle on the table.
“Kidney stones. Decrease in and eventual cease of sexual performance. Hypertension. Hepatic necrosis.” She listed blandly, crossing her arms and staring down at him.
Eying the bottle, he muttered, “I know the long-term effects of Vicodin use.”
“It’s not a very prudent way to kill yourself,” she informed him flatly.
“What makes you think I want to kill myself?”
“What else could you want?”
“To manage my pain.” He shouted, hand distractedly going to his thigh and clenching around the void.
“Manage it to what end?” She asked angrily, matching his volume and tossing her arms.
“So I can…”
“What? Live?”
Rubbing his head with his other hand, House pressed his eyes shut as he shouted, “Yes. Live. Live this life you so kindly bestowed me.”
A tense moment of silence passed as she reached into her jacket pocket.
Opening his eyes-albeit now clouded-House followed every motion she made as she produced a small carrying case and laid it on the table.
“If you’re going to kill yourself, Morphine is quicker.” She explained dryly, unfolding the case to reveal a syringe and vial of clear liquid.
Stunned, noticeably, House raised a dubious eyebrow at her.
“Why, Dr. Cuddy…I didn’t know you graduated from the Kevorkian School of Medicine.”
Ignoring him, Cuddy shrugged.
“Vicodin will just tear you apart from the inside out, and it’ll take its time doing it. At least Morphine is just a quick delivery into a long sleep.”
As she spoke, House picked up the case and examined the glass bottle, then the needle, all with remarkable precision for someone on the slippery slide to an opiate high.
After a moment, he looked up at her again with new consideration.
“Just enough to do the trick, and a small enough needle that the injection point wouldn’t be evident unless specifically sought. Probably would have told me to put it between my toes, too.” Tapping the empty syringe to his chin, he thought. “Almost as if you’ve done this before.”
She hoped her face didn’t pale, but she was certain it had when he gave her that look, that gotcha look.
“Which one of the kindly doctors you studied under showed you this crafty trick?”
“You want out, this is your way.” She repeated, as if he hadn’t spoken.
House continued, turning the syringe over in his hands as he speculated.
“It couldn’t have been Saunders. He’s a masochist-likes suffering with his patients. Gottlieb was far too optimistic for this kind of nihilistic thinking. Which leaves Glennon. It must have been him. You stayed with him the shortest time, too. All makes sense now.”
Realizing that she couldn’t really say anything that wouldn’t further feed this line of torture, Cuddy remained silent.
Which prompted him to push even harder.
“Who was it? An old grandma gasping her last senile breath? A mother of two with Stage Four ovarian cancer? Who was the first life you took, Dr. Cuddy?”
Her lips twitched as she shifted her weight.
“What’s your decision?”
Still interested, House leaned back against the couch again and shrugged.
“Can’t pressure a man into this kind of decision. Takes time. Consideration.”
“Based on your attitude yesterday, I thought this would be simple.” Cuddy murmured quietly.
House again gave her a dubious look, which slowly collapsed into a miserable one, and then a blank one.
She watched with a hot sourness in her stomach as he snagged the rubber strip from the case and tightened it appropriately on his arm, then tapped above it to stimulate blood flow.
Swallowing, Cuddy remained still as he reached over and filled the syringe with the Morphine, and then cleared the excess from the tip.
She wanted to be brave, to watch as he placed the needle over the bluing vein in the crook of his arm, but her eyes slid shut as tears simmered behind them.
When she heard the sound of the syringe hitting the table, she opened them.
House still had the band around his arm, but had put the syringe-full, she realized with a small intake of breath-back on the table.
It was hard to disguise her relief when she spoke.
“If you don’t want to die,” she scanned the room, gradually bringing her moistening eyes to him, “Then why are you doing this?”
He didn’t respond, except to shake his head so slightly it was barely perceptible.
Moving toward the table, Cuddy placed the syringe and vial back in the case, closed it, and put it back in her jacket.
“Take the Vicodin.”
“And?” he asked, knowing another shoe was about to come crashing down.
“There’s thirty in there. Either make them last the rest of your life, or start going to physical therapy.”
Bringing his hateful gaze back up to her, House asked in disbelief, “Are you kidding me?”
“No. Any further prescriptions for you go through me. I talked to Devlin today, in the dispensary.” She informed him coolly, not letting slip the rage she’d experienced when Devlin had admitted to giving House whatever he prescribed himself, “because he’s Dr. House.”
She’d practically throttled the young doctor (in addition to putting him on a probationary status) for ignoring her prescription, but there were more pressing matters.
“I guess when Hirst retired as Dean he left his megalomania to you.” House remarked darkly, then adding, “I could get it somewhere else.”
“You could.” Cuddy admitted. “But not for long, before you were figured out and blacklisted. It’s kind of hard to explain bouncing between pain doctors.”
The realization-and fury-that she was right registered in his features.
“I’m your access, House. Appreciate it. All for a few weeks of PT.” She offered soliticiously.
With a grunt, his eyes fell upon his leg.
“Let’s cut out your thigh muscle and see how a few weeks of PT feels.”
Knowing she’d won, or would, Cuddy shrugged. “It’s your choice. Let me know.”
“Is it too late to choose the Morphine? I might prefer that to being a subject of Dur Fuhrer.” He shot at her as she walked to the door.
Turning, her hand on the knob, Cuddy shook her head. “That’s not what you really want. You proved as much.”
Her calm must have revealed her, because she didn’t take another step before he said, “It’s Saline, isn’t it?”
Pausing, Cuddy thought seriously about lying to him.
“No. But it wasn’t enough Morphine to kill you.” She told him earnestly, looking over her shoulder at him.
A rueful laugh exploded from his mouth.
“Then what was the point?”
She shrugged.
“I needed to know something.”
“Did you get your answer?” he asked bitterly.
It was the first time she’d smiled since she saw him yesterday.
“Yes.”
After the door was closed behind her, House undid the rubber strip on his arm, and as he toyed with it, muttered to himself,
“We both did.”
#
On average, thirty tablets of Vicodin last a patient a week.
It lasted House three and a half days. Early evening Tuesday to the late hours of Friday night.
Cuddy didn’t have to look at her caller-ID to know it was him when she groped blindly in the darkness of her bedroom for the telephone.
“Dr. Cuddy.”
“I need more. I’ll go to PT in the morning, you can even pick me up. But I need more or I won’t sleep.”
Scrubbing the back of her knuckles in her eyes to wash the sleep out, Cuddy noted the time on the clock.
“I’ll be there at nine-,”
“Cuddy. Pills.”
Chewing on her lip, Cuddy paused.
“I’ll be there at nine, House.”
“Aren’t you listening? I need them now. Not six hours from now, now now.”
“As if you would wait until you were actually out to call me. Take whatever you have left over and were planning to stash, and I’ll bring you a dosage. At nine.”
She hung up before he could say anything else.
Next Part....